MESS Emulation

M.E.S.S. (Multiple Emulator Super System) is the only emulator for the Astrocade. Three versions for different operating systems are available here. Get the most up to date versions from the official M.E.S.S. website..

MESSD .561 MESS Astrocade Emulator - Win32

An older (version .561), precompiled, version of MESSD (Multiple Emulator Super System Dubugger) for Windows.

Although this version is quite outdated, it sort of supports extra memory (I understand that this was a bug). You can use the cartridges that require extra RAM (like Vipersoft BASIC and Blue Ram BASIC) with this version of the emulator. Once you have the On-Board ROM and cartridge in the correct directories, then you start it from the command line like this: 
MESSD ASTROCDE -CART Program
Version - 0.561
mess082b.zipMESS Astrocade Emulator - Win32Version - 0.82b
MacMESS70.sitMESS Astrocade Emulator - MacOSVersion - 0.70
dmess81b.zipMESS Astrocade Emulator - DOSVersion - 0.81b
MESS SnapshotsAstrocade MESS Snapshots - Optional use with MESS.Version - 0.70
MESS TitlesAstrocade MESS Titles - Optional use with MESS.Version - 0.70
MESS BASIC Stickers Astrocade MESS Keyboard Labels/Stickers

These are MESS Astrocade keyboard labels ready to be printed onto quality paper and then applied to a keyboard. For use with Astro BASIC, Bally BASIC, Blue Ram BASIC, Vipersoft BASIC, and Expanded BASIC. Printing onto sticker-paper is suggested but that is not required (sticker-paper does make adding the labels easier though).

The keypad stickers may be applied to any keys after the keyboard is mapped in MESS. Mapping the keys as a 4x6 column (just like on the Bally/Astrocade keypad) works extremely well. A sample picture of how a keyboard is set-up and mapped is included.

Note: Make sure NOT to use Page Scaling when printing these stickers, otherwise the stickers will not be the correct size to fit on the keyboard's keys.

For those with the ability to print a higher-quality version of just the labels (with no jpg artifacting!), then the original TIFF version is available here.

If you have the initiative and would like to change an individual button, the buttons can be downloaded in an archive that contains both a TIFF and a PSD of each button here